Cinema: Ugly Marriage

Early one workday morning, a middle-aged housewife staggers downstairs,
still half asleep, tying a well-worn tartan bathrobe around her. "Hey,
honey," her bright-eyed husband calls from the top of the landing,
"would you mind starting my eggs?" She nods, smiling slightly. "Hey,"
he says again, cutely. "I love you." Obviously this marriage is in
trouble.

Or, more obviously, Writer-Director Richard Brooks thinks it is. Exactly
why is never made clear, which is the crucial trouble with The Happy
Ending. The lady in question is Mary Wilson (Jean Simmons), who has
been married for...